MR. GLADSTONE'S FUTURE.
IN order to determine what Mr. Gladstone might do to revive and extend British colonization, it is requisite to compare the objects in view with the means at his disposal.
The objects are various—personal, ministerial, national. One Should think that Mr. Gladstone must wish to figure in contrast with his immediate predecessor—to restore what Lord Stanley destroyed—to undo what he ought not to have done, and to do what he left undone—to acquire as good a reputation, at least, as Lord John Russell took from the Colonial Office—to realize the notion of his friends that he has only wanted opportunity to show a great capacity for statesmanship. As one of a Ministry which has undertaken the difficult task of repealing the Corn- laws, he cannot but wish to make friends for the Government by pleasing the many "interests" that would rejoice if colonization were revived and extended : and, as we lately observed, one way of facilitating Corn-law repeal would be to provide the means of emigration for those whom a farmer's panic may throw out of employment. It is a national object to provide the resource of emigration for that ordinary excess of numbers, in all ranks, which Corn-laws have not prevented and free trade will not remedy ; to furnish more and more employment for capital and labour at home, by constantly extending the distant market for the sale of home productions—that is, by extending and multiply- ing those societies (such as the United States, whether before or since their national independence) whose natural business it is to produce food and raw materials for exchange with the manufac- turers of Britain. Here is inducement of all sorts in abundance— personal ambition, party sympathy, and patriotism. But the strongest motive to the attainment of the most desirable object may come to nothing for want of means. How stands Mr. Gladstone in this respect?
He has no money, and will get none from Parliament. But is cash in hand required ? The materials at his disposal would make the necessary money, or they comprise it. These are a nation overflowing with capital and people, and an empire of unoccupied land. The waste lands of our Colonies, if they were properly managed, would be a mine of wealth for the purpose of enabling the poor to emigrate. Abundance of capital would be invested in furthering colonization, if the Colonies were decently governed and thus made fit abodes for Englishmen above the rank of convicts or paupers—which they really are not at pre- sent. Good management of the waste lands and good Colonial government are the two things requisite to such an amount of colonization by this country as the world has never seen before. In both respects the present system, or rather practice, is miser- ably defective, and is condemned as worthless by every states-
manlike mind attends to the subject. A thorough change, then, in both respects, is indispensable to the ends before mentioned.
But thorough changes or complete reforms are generally hard to accomplish. Strong interests become identified with abuses, and successfully defend them long after they have been con- demned by opinion. This is the rule ; but there is at least one exception, and it consists of whatever relates to the Colonies of Britain. No interest possessing any weight would oppose the substitution of a good system of colonization and Colonial go- . vernment for the existing practices. As a Colonial reformer, Mr. • Gladstone would have all the powerful interests on his side : for - the permanent gentlemen in the Colonial Office are not a power- ful interest as against their chief. At least they are not so till he has been long enough in office to be got into scrapes which make him their instrument. Then they wield the power which till then is his.
The power of a Colonial Minister not yet scraped into depend- ence on his subordinates is in reality almost unlimited. What- ever the supreme Legislature can do with the materials of colonization, that he can do by the mere exercise of his own will. In all the other departments of government, Parliament judges, decides, and acts ; in this alone it either generally delegates its own authority to the Minister, or makes without inquiry what- ever laws he asks it to make. In all other departments of govern- ment, the Minister acts under a constant responsibility to Par- liament and the public : as to the Colonies alone, Parliament and public opinion meddle not, and the Minister is practically irre- sponsible. The Emperor Nicholas is not more powerful in Russia than Mr. Gladstone in the Colonies : nay, the Autocrat is less powerful than the Minister, inasmuch as the Russians do occasionally bring their Sovereign to account, whilst the British Colonies (always excepting Canada alone, whose vicinity to the United States makes the British Government afraid of her dis- content) are too distant from their Sovereign to have any sort of control over him. Thus, at any rarebit has been. And although public opinion in this country has, of late years, been so far awakened to Colonial questions that Ministers have been punished when they got into bad scrapes—though the last Colonial Minis- ter's extravagant love of getting into scrapes was punished by his being led the life of a toad under a •harrow and worried out of office—still there is nothing to prevent the Minister from going wrong if he likes to go wrong ; far less to prevent him from going right if he should wish to accomplish great im- provements or reforms. Power to revive and extend British colonization Mr. Gladstone does not want ; and few men, it is supposed, possess more suitable talents for the undertaking. Whether he will choose to enter on it is another question.
Were he to consult the gentlemen in his office, one of them, Mr. Taylor, the author of The Statesman, might quote his own book, (which, by the way, is dedicated to Mr. Stephen, and pur- ports to tell us what the writer has " known practically,") saying- " The far greater proportion of the duties which are performed in the office of a Minister [that of the Colonial Minister] are and must be performed under no effective responsibility. Where poli- tics and parties are not affected by the matter in question, and so long as there is no flagrant neglect or glaring injustice to indivi- duals which a party can take hold of, the responsibility to Parlia- ment is merely nominal, or falls otherwise only through casualty, caprice,' and a misemployment of the time due to legislative [Home] affairs. Thus, the business of the office may be re- duced within a very manageable compass without creating public scandal. By evading decisions wherever they can be evaded ; by shifting them on other departments or authorities where by any possibility they can be shifted; by giving decisions upon superfi- cial examinations—categorically, so as not to expose the super- ficiality in propounding the reasons ; by deferring questions till, as Lord Bacon says, 'they resolve of themselves' ; by undertaking nothing for the public good which the public voice does not call for; by conciliating loud and energetic individuals at the expense of such public interests as are dumb or do not attract attention; by sacrificing everywhere what is feeble and obscure to what is in- fluential and cognizable : by such means and shifts as these," says the subordinate of a lono. series of Colonial Ministers, a statesman may " obtain for himself the reputation of being a safe man,' and maybe without reproach—without other reproach at least than that which belongs to men placing themselves in a way to have their understandings abused and debased, their sense of justice corrupted, their public spirit and appreciation of public objects undermined." Thus it was when Mr. Taylor wrote, only a few years ago. He would probably add now, (for even them he said that he " re- volted' from his own view of the subject,) that the time for the beneficial use of " such means and shifts as these " is happily gone by. Mr. Taylor, who is really an able thinker as well as an old hand at the Colonial Office, must know, that, in consequence of the present ripeness of Colonial affairs for some important change, the Colonial Minister must make up his mind either to gain or to lose reputation. The Colonial Minister's mere powelis as much as ever greater than that of other Ministers ; but, inas- much as it is known that he can do just what he pleases, so, now, the public eye having been brought to bear on his department, he is more personally blamed than other Ministers when things go wrong. Things must go wrong under the present system ; and thus the Minister who does not make a good reputation by altering the system is sure to make a bad one by consenting to administer it unaltered. Mr. Gladstone's future depends in a great measure on which he may choose.
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